"But will soon have a mandate from the Minister, no doubt. Look, Charles, I've heard what you've been doing—little chats in cocktail bars, drinks at the Admiralty. They also say you've made quite a hit at the Yard."

"There is evidence, Martin. . . the woman does seem connected.

"And so you've turned her into a bloody industry." He frowned at the rustle of rats below. "Look, what do you want?"

"She just spent six most curious weeks in Paris. Now she's back in Amsterdam. . ."

Southerland shrugged. "So?"

"So I'd like to speak to your man there. That Jewish chap."

"Emile Faust? He'll eat you alive."

"I don't want to run him. I merely want to talk to him, to enlist his help on a . . . minor point."

"He won't like you, Charles. He won't like you one bit. Besides, he doesn't have time."

"It will only take an hour, two at the most."

Southerland withdrew the flask again, found it empty. "You know, this is commencing to become quite crude. I really do hate to mention it, to offend delicate sensibilities, but it is indeed growing rather crude.... First she snubs you for Rudolph Spangler. Then there's that mess in Berlin, and now you seem to be waging your own private war against her—and all without a shred of hard evidence."

"Well, Martin, that's the whole point, don't you see? Faust is the only one who can get us that evidence."

"Us, Charles? Us? Talk to him if you like, but I'll have nothing to do with this . . . understand?"

And Dunbar did understand . . . especially the likes of Martin Southerland, chaps who wanted it both ways.

Given the caliber of spies during the First World War, Emile Faust was very much ahead of his time. Whereas most British agents were hastily trained amateurs primarily responsible for little more than the observation of troop movements and the like, Faust had actually obtained a position within the German intelligence apparatus in Holland. To this extent he was a "mole" long before the term had been coined. Specifically he served as an operational assistant to Karl H. Cramer, Berlin's resident spymaster and information service director. As a Dutchman with both British and German antecedents Faust was also afforded a great deal of freedom; hence his periodic appearances in London.

He was a thin man, handsome in an odd way, with dark features. He tended to dress like bohemian, and his voice was very soft. He was a fighter as well, and also an independent operative—consequently making him a challenge to even the most experienced case officers.

It was a Friday evening when Dunbar met Faust, another chilly evening with fog and suspended rain. Faust had landed the night before and was presumably to stay through the weekend. From the German's point of view he had come to brief an agent in Portsmouth. Dunbar, however, found him in a safe house off the Regent's Canal.